03.15 Goals Roundup

In the beginning of the month my family came to the East Coast and spent a week in Philadelphia visiting. This was way more exciting and fun than accomplishing any of my goals for the month. Seriously though, my goals were put on the back burner while they were here and I don't regret that one bit.

1. Read a book: I sure did! I read "Still Alice" and loved it so much that I finished it in less than two days. While that may not seem super impressive, I'll let you know that doesn't happen too often around here, unless we're referring to "Eleanor & Park" that I read last month .

2. Take lots of pictures when my family visits: I could have taken a lot more photos because you can never have enough, but I'm definitely pleased with the amount and quality I did take. I really wanted to make sure that I took pictures of people, not just things. Pictures where people are the focus of the image are always my favorite and most memorable to me.

3. Finish Lauren's belated birthday cowl: I'm actually really surprised I managed to complete this in less than a month! While I did get stuck and frustrated a few times, this goal was really important to complete. I took a lot of "breaks" from knitting, but all in all I loved the pattern and will probably knit another Three Color Cowl someday. Don't worry, there will eventually be a separate post all about the super squishy cowl!

4. Reach 450 miles on my running shoes so I can get new ones: After my last long run on Saturday I easily broke past the 450 mile mark, just in the nick of time. Since I started running in the Summer of 2013, I've bought all of my running shoes at Fleet Feet because I love their shoe fitting process. Even though I always ended up liking the same exact brand and model, I kept going back even though I could've saved money and time just ordering the shoes online. Unfortunately this time though, I was on the completely opposite side of the country when I needed new running shoes and wasn't able to go to Fleet Feet. I decided to try a Philadelphia-based running store, Philadelphia Runner, that I walk past almost every day. While their shoe fitting process wasn't as comprehensive as Fleet Feet's, I'm still happy with their overall service. They still took the time to watch how I walk, looked at how my old running shoes wore, and talked to me about the various shoes I was trying on. The last three pairs of shoes I've bought have been stability shoes. I've been noticing though that the outside of my heels have been wearing much faster than the rest of my shoe, so I went into the shoe fitting process thinking that I could actually benefit from a neutral shoe. I was right; I do tend to supinate. I still found Asics to fit my feet the best, and so far I'm very happy with my new Asics Nimbus. I joked to my mom that I'm like Harry Potter and his Nimbus broomstick, at least she thought it was funny. 

5. Try a new recipe each week: Although I haven't used the definition of a "week" strictly, I did manage to bust out four new-to-me recipes this month. The first week I made Asian noodles, adapting The Pioneer Woman's recipe. Both Lauren and I enjoyed it, so much so that Lauren used my adapted sauce recipe to make a noodle cabbage salad a few weeks later. Even though Lauren made it before, I made Thug Kitchen's banana bread (best banana bread ever) and made sure every last bite was devoured with almond butter. We had a butternut squash to use from our CSA box so I decided to make butternut squash sauce over pasta. It was delicious and I thought it tasted really similar to macaroni and cheese. Although Lauren still liked it, the recipe didn't have the same connotation for her as it did for me. A few days ago after dinner, Lauren suggested we make dessert together. Normally we take turns cooking; it can get a little tricky with too many cooks in the kitchen. But I'm happy to report that everything went smoothly and we ate every last morsel of these vegan gluten free cookies by Minimalist Baker.

6. Finish THE quilt. (Let's try this one again): I still didn't bind the quilt. The shame.

7. Mend all of my clothes that need some TLC: I finally got around to patching a hole in a pair of warm, fuzzy Christmas socks. I even mended a broken strap on a night shirt. But alas, there's still a few clothing items that need some mending.

8. Fill three more frames for my art/gallery wall: I only got one more frame filled and I used paint chips to do it! There are still a lot more to go though, and I was still shy of fulfilling this goal.

9. Beat Lauren at least once in the Work Week Hustle using my FitBit: I beat her twice, actually!

10. Incorporate weights into my workout routine: I actually lifted weights several times this month. Even though this is more than all of last year combined (probably), I can't quite cross this off my goals list because lifting weights never became routine. I hit the weights on occasion, when I had an extra half hour to kill at the gym. Even though I wasn't successful, I figured out that in order to be, I need to lift lighter weights so that I won't be too sore to lift again within a reasonable amount of time. One day I'll get there.

Score for March: 6 out of 10.